History Student Reacts to Napoleon in Egypt #3: Death on the Nile by Extra History

Today we watch Napoleon in Egypt 3: Death on the Nile by Extra History.

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[kipplayingstation]

Hi Ethan 🤗, your commentary was as great as usual ❤️. There are some corrections to make however!
This video has surprisingly WAY less historical inaccuracies and mistakes compared to the other videos. (The next video is as bad if not worse than the second video!) But you actually made two small mistakes yourself, don't worry though since i am going to correct you!
Let's begin by your mistakes:
1/ Napoleon's communications with France.
Napoleon's communications with France were actually not completely cut, the 'Regency of Algiers' or إيالة الجزائر will actually keep Napoleon updated on the most important events happening in Europe, he will learn about the "War of the Second Anti-French Coalition" through them.
2/ Massacres after the "Cairo Revolt of 1798".
The massacres you talked about in the end of the episode ' taking place after the "Cairo Revolt" ' actually happened in the "second Cairo Insurrection" which itself happened in 1800, but at that point, the commander of French forces in Egypt was Kléber and Napoleon was far gone at that point, fighting in northern Italy at the Battle of Marengo 1800, these massacres probably led to Kléber's Assassination. After the "Cairo Revolt of 1798" Napoleon only executed the sheikhs and people who influenced the uprising which is something understandable. To punish the local population, instead of massacres, he introduced heavy taxes.
Now, the Egyptians that were inside the Al-Azhar mosque praying for their God to save them from Napoleon were not "innocent civilians" but in fact ARMED REBELS taking shelter inside the mosque with THEIR WEAPONS! It's totally understandable why in this case, Napoleon ordered his men to storm this holy site and kill them.
We must take into account that there were MORE THAN 80, 000 of them and that the French had to act quickly and decisively.
Final comment, Napoleon would leave Egypt in 1799 secure, secure, SECURE!
It's not like he left the army in a desperate situation fleeing and saving his life.
Napoleon would defeat the Ottoman and British efforts to reclaim Egypt by several measures, the allies will plan several offensives to kick Bonaparte and his Frenchmen out of Egypt and the middle east, one from the Levant ---> west, one as an amphibious operation in the Egyptian coast and finally one from Upper Egypt ---> north.
Napoleon however would beat them strategically, how? Well:
A/ he will lunch an offensive into the Levant to destroy the build-up of force there and although he would be stopped at the siege of Acre 1799 operationally, his great tactical victories in the campaign would secure his strategic goals, sieges of El-Arich 1799 (Egypt) and Jaffa 1799 (Palestine) plus his CRUSHING victory at the Battle of Mount-Tabor 1799 would eventually destroy the Ottoman strength in the region securing Egypt's right flank.
B/ he would pivot back to Egypt after the setback at Acre and will absolutely destroy the amphibious Ottoman force at the climactic Battle of Abukir 1799 crushing all of it.
C/ he sent a French expedition into Upper Egypt under the great revolutionary general Joseph Marie Dessaix to weaken the Egyptian strength there... which he would! And the future Maréchal Davout would actually be a part of it.

[samrevlej]

You keep calling the religious scholars "imams". In the Sunni world (which Egypt is a part of), imam is just someone who leads the prayer, as far as I know (generally they're a learned member of the Islamic community, but it's not a priesthood like Orthodox and Catholic clergy). In most forms of Shi'a Islam, the Imam is supposed to be the successor of Muhammad (like the caliphs were for the Sunnis). I think the term you're looking for is *'ulama* which are the scholars, theologians etc of the Islamic world.

[samrevlej]

22:50 France had officially abolished slavery in February 1794 (in response to the Haitian Revolution). Of course, that doesn't mean that all French officers were anti-slavery, especially if given the opportunity to practice it in a foreign land with likely very little repercussions, but it was theoretically forbidden. Napoleon tried to (and did) reinstate it in the French Caribbean when he was First Consul, in 1802. He failed in Haiti but succeeded in Guadeloupe and French Guiana (Martinique had been under British control since white planters there had grown afraid of slave revolution and abolition and had sided with Britain).